Muggle Science
by Mnsk
Summary: In which muggleborn Hermione Granger ponders the (lack of) physics in the Wizarding World, and exasperates many Wizards in the process.
1. Chapter 1

**A ****collection of short scenes in which Hermione Granger finds a few problems with the way physics works in the wizarding world.**

**Summary: Muggleborn Hermione Granger ponders the (lack of) physics in the Wizarding World, exasperating many Wizards in the process. **

Hermione Granger watched the Boy-Who-Lived closely. He was playing with a toy snitch that belonged to Dean.

He rolled it across the Common Room table. It went halfway before coming to an abrupt stop on the smooth surface.

"Where'd it go, Harry?"

The boy looked at her in confusion, "it's sitting right there."

"No, I mean the momentum. Where'd its momentum go? It just…disappeared."

There was some silence.

"I have no idea what you mean, Hermione," he turned back to the snitch and it rolled back into his hand.

She looked on suspiciously. Curious. Very curious.

O.o.O.o.O

"Hermione could you give us some light? It's getting darker," Harry Potter gestured for her to light up the hallway. They were returning to their dorm after staying late at the library, where Hermione had studied and Harry and Ron had played Wizard's Chess. It was getting late, and the cold winter day ensured that the sun disappeared long before curfew.

"Why don't you?" She asked.

"Because my wand's in my bookbag, and you're holding yours. It's faster," the Boy-Who-Lived gave her a confused look.

"And why doesn't Ron do it?"

"Because his wand is broken and I'd rather not risk it."

Ron nodded in agreement. Ever since the slug accident, he had kept his distance from it.

"I don't want to," she mumbled.

The other two boys stopped at stared at her.

"Why not? Is there something wrong?" Ron inquired.

She said something incoherent under her breath.

"What was that?" Harry asked, "we didn't hear."

"I said, I feel guilty when I cast Lumos," she huffed.

"Why on earth would you feel-"

"Because I'm violating the second law of thermodynamics! Of course I feel guilty! Poor Lord Kelvin would turn in his grave!" She exploded.

The hallway went back to being very quiet, and rather dark.

O.o.O.o.O

It was the middle of Christmas break, and Harry, Ron and Hermione were at the Burrow discovering the wonderful world of wizarding playthings.

"What a mess! You really have no idea how to put things back in their places!" Mrs Weasley burst out upon walking into the room with a platter of biscuits. Two young boys and one young girl watched her in shame, standing amid the toys littered all over the floor. The Weasley may not have had the best toys but with seven children, they sure had a lot of them.

"But mum, Harry's never had toys when he was young and Hermione's never played with magical toys!" Ron whined.

"I will have none of it. Ronald Bilius Weasley, these are your guests and you are responsible for playing in a safe, clean manner," she gave her youngest son a glare and then turned to the other two with a bright smile, "Come have some biscuits, darlings, they're fresh from the oven."

"The mess is partly our fault, Mrs. Weasley. We'll help clean," Hermione told her. She eyed the large mess sadly.

"Oh no, not to worry. I'll have it all cleaned up in moments, dear. You just go on and have something to eat," she said in the same sweet voice.

"In moments? But it's so messy!" Harry added, surprised.

"Well I can just use some magic!" She put the platter down and removed her wand from her apron, waving it around and muttering some things under her breath. Immediately, every toy in the room began to float and sort themselves into their respective toy chests and cabinets.

Ron looked completely unfazed at the magical act he had seen his mother perform a hundred times. Harry looked on in amazement and decided cleaning Dudley's room would have been much easier with a trick like that. Hermione, on the other hand, was wide-eyed and frozen to the spot.

"What's the matter, Hermione dear?" Mrs. Weasley asked in concern.

The bushy-haired girl put her hands to her mouth in utter shock and screamed out;

"The entropy! It decreased! The world is ending!"

O.o.O.o.O

Harry Potter had just finished a blissful two hours of flying. He walked into the broom shed with a wide grin plastered on his face, caressing his brand new Firebolt. On arriving, he found one of his best friends waiting for him.

"Harry, I just realized something," Hermione said suddenly when she spotted him entering.

The Boy-Who-Lived looked on and groaned. Hermione's realizations were starting to become a bother.

"What is it now?"

"You've been flying on your broom flying around for over two hours."

"Yes, Hermione, I have. Your point?"

"You're not tired."

The boy shrugged, "of course not. I'm all tired and sweaty after a Quidditch match because I'm nervous and I after to dodge things. All I did today was fly around."

"But you went rather high."

"I always do."

"And rather fast."

"You know, wind in my face, and all that."

"So where'd the energy come from?" She finally asked.

There was a moment of silence.

"Energy for what? Although I feel like I'm going to regret asking," Harry said.

"The energy you supplied the broom with to allow it to fly," she clarified.

"I didn't _give _it energy, I just used magic to make it work," he explained, although he knew that with Hermione, it was probably nowhere near satisfactory.

"That's impossible," the bushy-haired girl decided, "the broom must have needed force to overcome the force of gravity, a constant supply of it to keep it in the air. I've always supposed it came from you because you were tired after every match but you didn't expend much energy this time."

"Hermione I have no idea-"

"Let me explain, Harry," she took out a quill and a pad of parchment with a determined look on her face. Harry groaned again, knowing she was just getting started.

"Let's assume you were flying one hundred meters up in the air, or, if you're very particular, one-hundred-and-nine-yards-"

"I'm really not particular at all-"

"-Gravity would pull you down at nine-point-eight-one meters per second per-"

"I think we should leave it at that-"

"-second. You weight around fifty kilograms, or if you're more comfortable with Imperial-"

"No, no I'm not-"

"-seven-point-eight stone. If we use Newton's law-"

"please, Hermione, let's not use it-"

"We can multiply that and get four-hundred-ninety Newtons-"

"That's lovely Hermione you truly are the smartest witch of your age now we can just go back and-"

"Which is approximately the force that your broom needed to overcome in order to stay in the air-"

"And it is perfectly capable of doing so-"

"-If it had a supplier of energy. And I haven't even started on the force you need to accelerate forwards in the air instead of just staying there."

"Are you quite done?" The boy-who-lived asked, having not understood a word.

"Why no, Harry, I am not," she responded, still scribbling away with her quill without looking up, "approximately how fast was your average acceleration while in flight? I just need a ballpark figure."

"Hermione, I have your answer," the exasperated boy told her.

She looked in curiously, "what is it?"

"Magic."

The rest of the evening went by rather peacefully, save for Hermione, who was lecturing Harry on the meaning of 'false explanation', and Harry Potter himself, who was pulling his hair out in frustration.

O.o.O.o.O

It was the middle of Christmas break. Harry and Hermione were staying at the Burrow, but Hermione had agreed to spend Christmas day with her family. The Weasleys had gladly agreed, with Mr. Weasley offering to take her to King's Cross station where her parents would pick her up. Unfortunately, this required utilizing the one Wizarding travel system that Hermione had been avoiding with a vengeance ever since she had set foot in the Wizarding World.

"I refuse!"

"Come on Hermione it's not going to eat you!" Mr. Weasley explained. He once again shoved the pot of Floo powder in her direction, urging her to pick up a handful.

"No! I'll walk if I have to," the obstinate girl decided.

"That's a little over-"

"-twenty miles-"

"-we reckon," the Weasley twins added. They were leaning against the wall of the fireplace, watching the scene play out in amusement.

"Oh for Merlin's sake, why are you being so difficult?" Ron erupted, "just take the bloody Floo!"

"I can't! I'll disappear! I'll be gone forever!" She cried out, keeping her distance from the fireplace.

"What on earth are you talking about?" Mrs. Weasley asked.

"How do I know it'll even be _me_? You go in and you're consumed by a giant ball of fire, have you ever thought that you're being completely destroyed in one place and recreated in another? Someone that looks and acts exactly like me may come out on the other side, but what if it's not _me_? This raises too many metaphysical questions and I do not wish to go on until firm ground is established!"

There was a moment of silence while the Weasleys and Harry watched her in confusion. She had lodged herself firmly on one side of the fireplace, refusing to go on.

"What do you-"

"Don't ask that question !" Harry cautioned.

Mr. Weasley looked at him, "why not?"

"Because…she might answer," Harry shivered.

"Fine. Flying car it is. Pack up, Hermione," Mr. Weasley relented, placing the pot of Floo powder back on the shelf near the fireplace.

"Thank you Mr. Weasley!" She came out in excitement and picked up her bags, "a car is much better. At least I know how it works."

"I think-"

"-she didn't hear-"

"-the 'flying' part," the Weasley twins whispered with glee.

O.o.O.o.O

An Order of the Phoenix meeting had just terminated. Everyone had left the discussion table at 12 Grimmauld place except for Hermione Granger, who was sketching something on a sheet of parchment with the curious muggle contraption she called a 'pen', and Sirius Black, who lived there.

"What's that you're drawing?" Sirius asked curiously. He didn't have much to do around the lonely house, might as well make use of the fact that someone was staying behind and giving him some company.

The girl remained silent, drawing careful lines and arrows with blue ink. She didn't seem to have noticed him.

"Ahem," he cleared his throat loudly. At this, she looked up.

"Yes, Sirius? Did you ask something?"

"I asked what you were drawing," he stood up and walked around the table to peer at her parchment from over her shoulder, "it's a very…creative…picture. Maybe some color would help."

"It doesn't need color. It's a blueprint," she explained.

"…A blueprint of what?"

"A perpetual motion machine. I just realized that you can make one if you charm a piston to keep moving no matter what the load."

"And what's this here?" Sirius pointed at a thick arrow with a mass of labels scribbled through it.

"A Sankey diagram. One that Sankey himself would be proud of, since literally no energy is spent."

"I see…"

She continued her sketching with glee, "one day I'll build it and sell it and be rich. And then I'll buy all the books in the world."

Sirius Black sighed.

"…Aren't you ever going to give up all this silly muggle stuff?"

"Never!"

**Note: the one on entropy is meant figuratively; many textbooks use 'a messy room' to first introduce the concept.**


	2. Chapter 2

**I've been having way too much fun with this...**

**The last scene was inspired by a post written by LessWrong (pen-name of the author of HPMOR).**

**Chapter 2**

Severus Snape despised teaching. He hated it with a passion. Especially when students tried to seek him out after class to clarify things. This was why he listened to the persistent knock on his door with clenched teeth, and finally spluttered out a rude "come in".

Who else could it be but the girl who now starred in his nightmares almost as frequently as James Potter himself? Hermione Granger stood in his doorway in the same way that she had stood there for the past five days, ever since the beginning of the school year, and walked briskly over to his desk. Annoying, infuriating brat of a first year that she was, she felt it necessary to question everything.

"Hello Professor Snape, I hope I wasn't bothering you-"

_Stop hoping, then. _

"-but I need to ask a few questions-"

_I'd really rather you didn't._

"Firstly, I didn't understand what you meant-"

_Of course you didn't._

"-by this last step when you gave us the instructions for the Boil Cure Potion," she flipped through a small bound muggle notebooks she had on hand practically every time he saw her.

"Ah yes, here it is. The second last step here is to add the butober leaves, and it says that the potions should 'aflame with green fire before settling into a delicate shade of mauve'," at this she looked up at him questioningly.

Snape gave a world-weary sigh and glared down at her, "and what, Miss Granger, is your question?"

"Well isn't that impossible? I mean, the ingredients include…common yew leaf extract, newt's saliva, and a few other things, none of them constituting any sort of fuel, let alone boric acid. How on earth are we supposed to get green fire?" She looked up again from her notebook and watched him with an expectant look.

Ah yes, as a half-blood, Severus Snape knew all about the muggle science she mentioned every two seconds. He had never studied it, but had read a few old books on it that he vaguely remembered. Annoying muggle-borns.

"Miss Granger in case you have not yet noticed, there is such as thing as magic-"

"Yes but even magic has to make sense, doesn't it?"

There was a moment of silence, where the girl stood in front of his desk with her little notebook, and Severus Snape slowly counted down from ten. Once he had reached the last mental digit, he found that it had little effect, and he began the process once more.

A few moments later, he spoke.

"Miss Granger, I have no idea what to say to that, and I suggest that you leave my office and try finishing your homework before dissecting it," he warned with a glint in his eye.

Luckily, the girl had some brain cells left, and quickly gathered her notebook and left the room.

When Harry Potter walked into the library to find Hermione and inform her of the second petrified student found at Hogwarts, he had to walk around practically every aisle before finally seeing her. She was deep in one of the older bookshelves, engrossed in a thick tome with a rather terrified expression on her face.

He approached her stealthily, and as soon as he was near enough he burst into frantic whispers.

"Hermione, listen. I saw another petrified student in the infirmary! And it happened right after I heard the voices! Something's doing this, something's…Hermione? Are you alright?"

The girl hadn't listened to a word, still staring at a picture in her book. She slowly turned her head to see him.

"Harry, we have to do something about this."

"Yes, I know. I think we should do some research and find the truth."

"Agreed."

"We need to find the source of this, maybe it's just an accident."

"It would be lovely if it was an accident, if it was done on purpose, our classes may no longer be safe for learning."

"Yes, but we have to assume the worst-"

"No…"

"We have to assume there's some kind of monster in Hogwarts."

There was a moment of silence in which Hermione stared at him blankly.

"What on earth are you talking about Harry?"

"The petrified students! What else?"

"This!" She shoved the book in his face, where there was some sort of illustration done in ink. Some circles and swirls.

Harry pushed the book away from where it was shoved against his nose, "what do you mean?"

"Look at it! It's an astronomical image of the solar system, and the earth is right in the middle!"

"Hermione-"

"Wizards may actually still think the earth is at the centre of the universe! This is preposterous!"

"Hermione!-"

"A generation of wizards and witches are going to learn about this in Astronomy!"

"Hermione!" Harry finally burst out, "you're holding a book from the fifteenth century! Wizards aren't _that _stupid!"

…

"Oh."

"Harry, Ron, I have come to a conclusion," Hermione Granger stated. They were in the middle of Potions class, making the Boil Cure Potion that they had been instruction to research the previous week. Hermione's potion was currently in the middle of the 'aflaming' process, while Harry and Ron were still pouring in the newt saliva with their faces scrunched up in disgust.

"Lovely. We'd rather you didn't, and helped us instead," Harry told her, his nose wrinkled.

"You're doing fine with that Harry, just maybe try and keep that saliva off your fingers, I think it's corrosive," she smiled, "more importantly, I've come to the conclusion that here in the Wizarding World, energy isn't degraded."

She was met with two blank stares.

"I mean, have you seen these enchantments? It's in every housekeeping spells book! There are spells to keep your clock turning forever, there are instructions on how to spell a water wheel to rotate and never stop. There's nothing lost to the environment, it's every engineer's dream!"

By this time, their professor had walked over and was openly glaring at her for speaking so loudly and disrupting the class, but she ignored him and went on.

"I think we ought to invent some new laws of thermodynamics."

"Yes, Miss Granger, we should," their agitated professor spoke up, "and while we are doing so, we may find it necessary to invest time in inventing new laws of motion. Now get back to your cauldron, Miss Granger, or your potion will burn up," he turned away sharply.

Place: Professor McGonagall's office

Date: September 10th, 1993

Time: 6:00 pm

Hermione Granger stared at the small golden device lying on her desk; absolute terror was shining in her eyes.

"This is the only option, I'm afraid. I understand that the concept of time travel scares some students…" Professor McGonagall began.

Hermione picked the device up gingerly, examining it in nimble fingers and taking the utmost care to not touch the little spinning pin centered on its golden edge, "I'm not scared, Professor."

"Good, then we may continue-"

"I'm terrified!" She placed it back on the desk and inched away from it, "isn't there another way? Ways that won't require me to commit large scale atrocities?"

McGonagall watched her with pursed lips, her pointed hat standing straight up on her head. She had decided for the first time to offer one of her best students a glorious chance for success, but if she was going to be this adamant…

"Miss Granger what in Merlin's name do you mean?"

"If I go back in time I'll **change **things, that's not good! That means that I'll erase the present and make it again, effectively killing the present forms of everyone alive! It's atrocious that people can use these things!" She exclaimed.

"Ah", Minerva McGonagall sat back in her chair, mentally patting herself on the back for having actually understood what she was saying, "you must be worried about the past and future yous meeting up. Well, we have a general solution for that, just avoid running into your past self and you'll be just fine. Now we'll have to arrange a schedule-"

"That's not what I mean, I'm worried about paradoxes! Even if you disregard the fact that I'd be committing mass suicide, what would happen if I go back and accidentally and inadvertently cause my parents to never meet? What would happen to me?"

Seeing Professor McGonagall's confused look, she clarified.

"I mean, my parents met in a small flower boutique near their university. What if I went there one day and picked out a flower, and this happened to be the flower that my father would've supposed to have been picking up and my mother will have supposed to comment on his choice of rose! If I take that flower, then my mother will have never been supposed to say that comment, which means my parents would have never started that conversation, which means they would have never met and I would have never been born!"

"Miss Granger my brain is aching. How on earth would you be able to prevent your parents from meeting if we already know that they met?"

There was a moment of silence.

"Pardon?" A confused Hermione asked.

"If they've already met in the present, you can't stop them from meeting in the past, it doesn't make sense", she explained patiently.

"…So I wouldn't be able to influence the past if I went back in time?"

"No, of course not!"

"Then how would I be able to go back in time? Even breathing counts as influence, you know."

"But all of it has already been done, you see", Minerva McGonagall adjusted her spectacles and hoped the annoying third year would go away soon, "if you decide to take the time turner, you will have already been going to classes with it."

"The future…of the past…has already been done in the present?"

"Yes, the future-to-past Hermione has already influenced the present", she replied with a straight face.

"Your brain is aching? YOUR brain is aching, Professor?" The frazzled girl yelled.

"Well, I do suppose it sounds a little confusing when put that way but I assure you it makes perfect sense when you actually try-"

" Confusing? This is worse that topology!"

Hermione left the room holding her head.


End file.
